Just bad luck with eCommerce?

Along all year of 2021 I had the opportunity to be member of the Universal Postal Union (UPU) Consultative Committee, an organization under the United Nations responsible to, among other issues, improve the international dialogue among government organizations, postal service operators and non-postal service providers. ?Representing the only Brazilian organization at UPU Consultative Committee at that time, the Brazilian Association of Institutional and Government Affairs ( ABRIG - Associa??o Brasileira de Rela??es Institucionais e Governamentais ), I had the opportunity to learn and discuss best practices from multiple countries on issues such as the positive and negative aspects of postal services privatization processes in multiple countries; environmental solutions being adopted as to minimize the postal service carbon footprint; and integrated GOV solutions to implement better cross-border policies, particularly relevant for eCommerce operations.

When discussing eCommerce and logistics with postal service and non-postal service operators, independently on the country, there are some aspects that need to be considered.? At first: government regulations.? What are the rules related to private and public courier service providers, particularly related to eCommerce and international trade operations?

It may sound absurd, but few countries have customs and courier services REALLY integrated.? And that lack of integration turns to be a big problem, particularly to the overall population that shops online.? The problem gets even more complex when we talk about import taxes that are extremely high in some countries, such as Brazil. The Brazilian import taxes are so high that is frequently associated to market protectionism. What are the results of that? Does it really protect local companies, or could that harm the economy, including Brazilian companies intending to sell their products in foreign eCommerce platforms / marketplaces?? I had the chance to deep in this topic, and this is really an important issue that has not been having much serious discussions.

Sometimes I have the impression that government regulations are somehow frozen in the past, with a wrong perception that eCommece applies only to low-cost products. Is it really?

Consumers behavior has been changing, as several research publications details the growing tendency of eCommerce and marketplaces.? Consumers have been purchasing all kind of products, including grocery products, clothes, as well expensive articles.? However, logistics is a BIG PROBLEM yet to be solved. The issue is not only related to the long period necessary for a product to reach its destination, but is necessary to consider the after sales: what if a product needs to be returned? In the Brazilian case, if a company sells a product to be delivered in another country, if the foreign costumer is willing to return the product, the Brazilian company will have to pay taxes to bring that product back to Brazil, besides returning the money back to the foreign client. That doesn′t make sense.

I have had some positive and negative experiences with eCommerce.? When I was a kid, and my grandparents lived in Germany, they used to send me Christmas gifts about 3 months before Christmas – that was the time necessary to have a mail parcel delivered in Brazil, coming from Germany.? A letter used to take 7 to 10 days..? Most impressive is that such situation that occurred in the 1980s is yet a regular situation nowadays.. ?Why is that??

My daughter is crazy about a famous singer – Harry Styles.? And you know, sometimes we do things to our kids as to make them happy, even knowing that a special request may turn into a challenge.? And that was about it: eCommerce.?

My daughter wanted to have a gift box from Harry Styles, from its official webpage, which is located in the UK (cross-border eCommerce). It took almost 4 months to have the purchase delivered!! 4 Months!! And we are talking about something recent, not a situation such I had in the past, when I was a kid and my grandparents would send me Christmas gifts from Germany to Brazil. We are talking about a product that was purchased online last year, 2022. I found that crazy, but accepted the challenge as the information on the long waiting period was informed on the webpage.. Date of purchase: May 6, 2022. Delivered date: August 24, 2022.? If I only knew that I would be able to visit Harry Styles’ popup store in NYC a few weeks later, on May 26, 2022.. Yep, I could have bought the same product in New York, but I had already done the online purchase a few weeks before. It was a busy trip, accompanying a delegation of GOV officials, attending meetings on urban infrastructure and solid waste management, but I could not return to Brazil without a picture (and a gift) from the popup store for my daughter. Yep, I went to Harry Styles store, got a gift, and the online purchase was delievered only after that...

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But the eCommerce experience can get even worst…

I have always traveled quite frequently, nationally, and internationally.? And whenever I travel, I am used to buy stuff for me and my home.? Sometimes something small, sometimes products that I can′t find or are too expensive back home.? It’s quite interesting, as almost everything I have at home has its own story – it’s not just a product that was bought at a regular shopping mall. ?

I have always had a very busy work routine, but on weekends, whenever is possible, I like to cook. Its not only about cooking, but the overall cooking experience: to listen some music, while drinking some wine, eating some cheese and olives as starters, and cooking a delicious risotto as main dish. That’s my way to relax and to allow myself to spend some quality time doing something nice.? And because of a risotto, I decided to buy a special pan to cook rice… I don’t remember exactly where abroad I saw a specific pan for rice cooking, but that came to my long-time purchasing list – not a priority, but whenever possible, I wanted to have that.? I know, sounds crazy, but that has been going on for several years.? When I moved earlier this year to a new city, I had to buy stuff for my new apartment, including a pan to cook my specialties.? As I could not find the product I wanted, I decided to buy online.? I decided to buy a cast iron pan from a French company with operations in Brazil. The promise at the webpage was to have it delivered in 10 days… Purchase date: July 9, 2023.? Delivery date: September 20, 2003.

It was a very unfortunate situation, as looks like a drama story.

At first, there was a delay sending the product to my address due to some misinformation related to my location.? Once that was solved, the purchased product was delivered to a local store in a shopping mall in a completely different city (Florianópolis), and I got a number of labels delivered to my address that was expected to be received at that store in Florianópolis… eMails explaining the situation at the helpdesk were also not delivered… anyway… after several complaints, I was finally informed that the product was on the way to my address through Correios , the Brazilian national currier… Yet, looks like a Correios representative went 2 times to my address while I was away, but I had not gotten any notification from the post office, nor from anyone else.. I was only informed about that situation when I contacted (once again) the helpdesk of the French company to check on the status of the delivery, when I was finally informed that I had to pickup my purchase at the local post office…

While the situation looks funny at some point (now I have a new story to tell), it′s easy to see multiple logistics and communication problems related to my online purchase, which didn’t have cross-border issues that could eventually explain the multiple problems I had.? While communication solutions improved in recent years, it looks to be plenty of improvement opportunities in the eCommerce and logistics, including at Correios operations.? How could I have received labels to be delivered to a store at Florianópolis shopping mall, while my purchased product was sent to that specific store? Why nobody from the store contacted the central operations on not having received the labels they were expecting to receive?? Were they expecting a single item, just as my purchased item? ?Why did Correios not inform that someone had been to my address and was not able to deliver my package? Why Correios didn’t leave a message at my address box, and, why did they not send me a phone message, as a telephone number is frequently requested whenever sending priority packages??

Yep, too many questions..

Coming back to government affairs, recently, Brazil implemented new policies related to cross-border products purchased online at international marketplaces, targeting low-cost products value up to US$ 50.00.? Brazilians are buying significantly online, and the amount of products purchased from international marketplaces has been growing year after year, particularly starting the COVID pandemic period. It′s interesting to see how the Brazilian national postal service provider had to adopt its infrastructure, from letters to mail parcels to be delivered in all Brazilian cities.? Not a very easy task.? And that turns to the debate if Correios should go through a privatization process. ?Would that improve the quality of the service? A question that is frequently being debated. Not to mention the competitive aspect among other service providers, such as Amazon, Mercado Livre, DHL and other companies with similar services related to mail parcels. It is worth checking some reports from specialized consulting companies on this issue, it would be just too much to be addressed here.

Along my experience at the UPU Consultative Committee, I had the chance to attend some events, two of them were quite remarkable: (1) UPU Congress in Abidjan, that discussed multiple worldwide postal challenges; and (2) national best practice of Vanuatu, when the Government decided to e-integrate the country customs to its postal services.?

While all countries look to have similar challenges related to courier services, it appears to me that the challenge is not only about logistics, but enabling good communication services after all – and that could be easily improved.

As consumer, the worst thing as eCommerce shopper is the lack of information: not to know when a product will be delivered, as the traceability of a product lacks consistent information. I may even accept to wait for a long period to have a product delivered, but not knowing the details of the process makes the overall experience just terrible. Is it too difficult to communicate the consumer on the status of a purchase, or to provide information whenever problems delivering a product happens?? Anyway.. it really makes me rethink if all eCommerce tendency and positive numbers are really true.? Are customers willing to accept such bad service? Or, perhaps, am I too picky??

The client experience is yet a challenge that sometimes turns into a nightmare, particularly whenever purchasing online. And that turns into another topic: client loyalty. I would be glad to hear other perceptions about eCommerce and client loyalty. I appreaciate any thoughts on these topics.

https://linktr.ee/BernhardSmid

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